Buddha's Blend

I swear I looked at the clock not even five minutes ago and it was just 6:00 PM, but now it’s nearly 11:30! Where does the time go! Oh well, I’m not even remotely tired, so I can still get a few more episodes of Chuck and some good cups of tea.

Robyn gave me a tin of this for Christmas and even though I hated it as an iced tea just a few weeks ago I figured that I’d try it hot and at least give it a fighting chance before completely dismissing it. She knew it wasn’t in my cupboard which is why she picked it out, I guess she just didn’t know why it wasn’t in my cupboard.

So, I’m using 1 1/2 tsp. (barely) in 10 oz. of water. I kept my water temp. and my steep time both very low in the hopes of preventing this from turning this into a bitter/chemical mess. I also paired it with some heavily butter and ketchup shaker soaked popcorn because I might as well be having at least one thing I really enjoy.

The problem is this smells so promising! Just absolutely juicy and sweet and delicious. But based on the reviews I’ve read and my own experience prior to now it just can’t deliver. That said this mug’s not super bad. It does linger especially close to that perfume/chemical line – but at least this time around it’s not bitter. It’s way more peachy than I remember experiencing with the iced cup I had, too. That’s a plus in my books.

I won’t write it off completely yet – maybe I can perfect the ‘art’ of brewing this particular blend, though it seems daunting in how finicky it is. Usually I have no patience with finicky teas, but this one was a gift so I’m going to at least put in a little effort to make it work…

TIme to cross another tea off the neverending list to try! (Although I’m thrilled – I just put 5 teas in the fridge to cold steep, which used up the last of three of them, none of which I’m likely to restock! Progress!)

Dry, the tea smells peachy and a bit floral. Steeped, much the same but to a lesser degree.

Ack! This tastes oversteeped and somewhat bitter. I can taste the peachy flavour (tastes like fuzzy peaches), something floral (jasmine? rose petals?), an oolong creaminess, but it’s just not doing it for me. Too floral, too in-your-face. To be honest, I’m making a face as I drink this too. Bleh. I guess we’ll try a shorter infusion next time, but I suspect this won’t be a favourite. The aftertaste is nice though, lingering floral and oolong notes, I think.

Sipdown!! (208)

Thank you Aimee Popovacki for sharing some of this with me. Unfortunately this was too bitter and too floral for my tastes and it got dumped. That may have been due to it being broken up a fair bit so I won’t rate it but ultimately I don’t think this tea is for me.

The aroma of this one appealed to me so strongly in store a few months ago that I broke my own rules and bought a Davids Tea white blend. Their whites are outrageously priced in my opinion, and rarely have much tea in them. The smell of this one though…MMMM. Apparently I really like the aroma and taste of floral teas, because this one is a floral POW and I love the smell. The sales person had recommended it to me because I really like Three Wishes, another floral blend.

Yesterday was the beau’s birthday and also one of our last days with the rental car as ours has been deemed a ‘total loss’ and now we are working on getting a payout. A very very small payout. So now we get to pay for a wedding and invest in a new car, only 6 weeks after having got the last one. Grr. Anyway, we went to visit my grandmother yesterday while we still could and then went out for dinner and a movie (The Hobbit) to celebrate the beau’s birthday.

Today we are cleaning up the place and trying to relax a bit before his father and sister stop by to celebrate once again. I’ve also made bread and a cake – a busy weekend, for us. So, the beau offered to make tea to relax a bit but unfortunately it sat forgotten on the table and steeped for 20 minutes. Blergh.

Second try, we forgot it again and steeped it an extra minute. This is an expensive tea and we’ve already wasted about half our sample, so we’re determined to drink this one come hell or high water. It is incredibly fragrant, throwing off waves of what I assume must be jasmine. Up close, it pus me in mind of Tim Hortons peach drink from my childhood – in the most nostalgiac delicious way. The taste of this one is very true to the aroma – jasmine that tricks me into peach followed by a bit of astringency from being over-steeped. My bad. Though I would prefer there not be this astringency, this is a remarkable blend. It obviously isn’t one to take a beating, but even this over-steeped cup is perfectly drinkable, though very drying at the end of the sip.

The beau keeps wandering around proclaiming it as delicious, saying that he wants to buy more and wishes it weren’t so expensive. I have a feeling that some of this will end up in our cupboards for a special treat. :)

PS – I don’t notice any white or green tea taste specifically, for which I am very grateful. There also isn’t anything tart so obviously hibiscus blossoms work differently from hibiscus petals. This is really quite tasty!

Many thanks sent out to tigress_al for this tea!

I was bummed out that right after I moved, this tea was up for tea of the month at DAVIDsTea – if I had waited a few days to move I would of been able to buy a sample. Then when I went to do a DAVIDsTea order months later and opted to get Earl of Lemon instead (since they were both expensive teas). So Buddha’s Blend has been on my wishlist for awhile to try as I’m a sucker for jasmine/floral teas.

DRY: Ultra tangy peach smell! WOW Something about jasmine + flowers that makes that peachy smell.

STEEPED: Slight peachy smell. Steeps up some crazy huge leaves and flowers that are like 3-4" long!

TASTE: Strong peachy taste. A bit of unusual bitterness that I’m guessing is SUPER FLORAL BOUQUET OVERLOAD. A slight hint of sweetness and with a jasmine aftertaste.

WHO`D LOVE THIS TEA: Someone who loves floral teas.

COMMENTS: This is the most floral tea I’ve tasted so far.
I actually tried this tea in my travel tea glass first and actually got to it an hour later with the leaves still in and it was CRAZY bitter and flowery that I couldn`t finish it.
With that said, for this tea you need to take the time and correctly steep it – I did a quick 3 minute steep with a slightly lower temperature just to be safe (79c) and it was loads better, but still a bitterness present. Maybe it might be worth going as low as 73C/165F?

I find this tea slightly similar to “Three Wishes” but Three Wishes is much more bitter (and finicky) since it has black tea. One of my favorite teas, Lovers Cup by Silverleaf is similar to Buddha’s blend, but not as strong floral or bitter.

But overall, that peachy taste is very good and the floral is nice. However it does step into “Too much floral” zone for me (that I didn’t know existed). This be a great tea to serve at a tea party and decorate with lots of flowers.

Another floral from my swap with Kittenna! I’m making progress. This is one of the ones I requested since I love floral teas, so I was confused by this when I sniffed it. It’s so… peachy. The description doesn’t mention peach at all, nor is it explicitly in the ingredients, so what gives? I mean, it’s not lightly peach, it’s VERY peach. You’d think they would mention that.

Peach surprise aside, this is a pleasant blend! There are some big jasmine pearls in there, but the taste definitely is only mildly floral in mine. I think the peach kind of masks some of the other flavors, since I’ve lost the subtlety I’d expect from a white blend. The jasmine is there, but only faintly, and that nice “fresh” almost grassy/springy taste from the white seems to be hiding. It’s allllmost there, but it’s hard to pick out individual notes when your entire cup is all BAM PEACH. Funnily enough, this is one of the best peach flavorings I’ve tried, which is odd… why don’t they market this as a peach blend?

I’ve never had white hibiscus, but there’s a soft sharpness (oxymoron, but it makes sense… sort of) going on. A bit tart, so it’s reminiscent of a not-yet-ripe peach. Okay, that doesn’t sound so great, but you know when fruit is almost at its peak, and still has quite a bit of firmness left but the flavor isn’t as strong? That’s honestly when I like fruit best, I like ‘em very firm and that mushiness associated with fresh peaches is a big consistency problem with me. I’m fine with them in baked goods, but fresh… too squishy! So I do like the memories the white hibiscus brings up. I do wish it was less fruity and more floral though, so I’m going to give it a shorter steep! Or perhaps cold brew the rest of my leaves.

The smell of this tea is amazing!! heavenly.
And at first… it tasted great! peachy and floral, oh yes, it was lovely! but as it cooled, some icky jasmine notes came out to play. Not my thing!
I couldn’t finish the cup.
So this one, it seems… is not for me. Oh well. C’est La Vie!

Guh. I didn’t think I’d like this, I avoided it due to hibiscus, but…guh. I took a sniff at the store, thank goodness my wife asked to sniff it! Wednesday we brought home 10 grams and today I went back for a tin. It’s fruity and light and I cannot wait to try it iced!

Buddha’s Blend has a great floral fuzzy peaches scent to it but it doesn’t come off as a “candy” tea. The smell was definitely a selling point for me.

The first time I prepared this I experienced that astringency that only comes from oversteeping, or using water that’s too hot. Despite my mistake, it wasn’t undrinkable and the taste was heavy on the peaches with a perfumed milky endnote like plain yoghurt-both sour and creamy.

This time around I think I got it right, with a cup that’s simply a creamy, floral, peach delight with only a shadow of tartness. The last flavour is still light jasmine but it is no longer abrasively sharp. This tea is so indescribably smooth and full bodied with only the slightest puckering sensation that it may be a contender for my more permanent collection. The white and green leaves do give off detectable complex flavours but I think I’m picking up more white, here. Smooth, creamy, floral, fruity notes coexist with the more prominent jasmine and white hibiscus. Everything blends flawlessly together and holds up well on second steep. The only downside is the floral fruitiness of it can become overwhelming and the more bitter aspects of the tea leaves come out more as it cools.

Note: when I come across something new and edible that I’ve never tried before I usually attempt to eat it. This is what I did with the white hibiscus after first steep and it was so deliciously creamy and subtly sweet that… Yes, I probably shouldn’t have eaten it but I was curious and now I have an idea where the milky fruit flavour comes from. For those who saw “hibiscus” and shied away, it tastes very different from the normal, very tart, red variety that infiltrates most blends.

Hmm, this was an interesting tea. It smells very peachy.
Taste: mostly a peachy taste with a little jasmine. The tea taste is a little hidden underneath though. I didn’t have any hibiscus blossoms in my steep.

I like it, but that peachy taste is throwing me off, like other have mentioned, the description says just natural flavouring……so where is the peach taste coming from?

2nd steep: 85degrees, 4 minutes, I actually like this steep better, less peachy flavour, more jasmine, and more tea taste!